Spots on my fish

[alan j t]

Recently saw spots on one fish and now another fish they're on the belly and lower fins the second fish has just started to get it on top of its mouth
water is as good as it gets and no suddend temperature spikes to my knowledge and the only thing new to the aquarium are some plants

[alan j t]

o one more thing its not ick spots more like blocthes
my fish are always stressed my kids are always running aroud and my neighbors above me are really loud as well
ive tried plants to help them alwell as drift wood
the only time they come out is at feeding time and especially at night when all is calm so any help would greatly appericeted

[scott bowler]

hi Alan welcome to the forum mate , can you get a pic of the sick fish up .so we can have a look thanks mate

[alan j t]

i dont have a camera sorry
one of my discus just died it was swimming a little crooked and hanging at the top of the tank +2 rams and a cory cat took the plunge

so i bumped up the temp and added salt and plenty of air stones
thinking it was a parisite i put some formalin3
the fishes are not swimming crooked anymore but the 2 with the blotches still have them it looks like bite marks or something like it
the water is fine but i took out the plants in fear the meds would destroy them
the discus hide but eat well

i dont know what else to do

[Greggy]

I think I know what you need to do... you need to do some BIG water changes, and fast! Perhaps change 50% of the water twice a day, remember to double-dose the new tank water with Prime (or your trusted water ager/conditioner) as well as get the temp of the new water up as close to the tank temp as you can before pumping it in (buy/borrow a spare aquarium heater). Keep the temp at about 30C but no higher or you might lose more Catfish & Rams.

As someone once said, there are not many bad (water) conditions that water changes won't fix or improve. Adding meds such as formalin/formaldehyde might assist with some parasites (eg Ich or gill flukes etc) but right now I would not start medicating until you know what your dealing with. Wrong meds can make matters worse, plus formalin will harm your biological filtration systems and this will really make things worse! Discus are tough and can survive quite a while even when badly infected with various dieases such as Ich, HITH, infected open wounds and gill/body flukes etc, but they will drop like flies if the water quality is off (e.g. some Nitrite in the water). Trust me on this. There have been cases of Discus Plague but these days I would imagine its fairly rare, and even then it can be cured if you act fast.

What filtration systems are you using? How long has this tank been up and running? What are your Ammonia and Nitrite levels (before you begin your daily water changes)? If either of them don't read absolute zero you've found your problem.

A final note, I think its a myth that (tank raised) Discus need to be kept in dim tanks in quiet parts of the house/office. My 6x2x2 sits in the main living room and we have two kids (one a 3yo and a 7mo) and you could not get more traffic and noise in that room, and now that I've gotten over my own little recent tank 'disaster' (I lost 4 Discus due to a Nitrite spike of 1ppm - yes even Nitrite at the lowest detection level can kill Discus!!) I can say that Discus (when not stressed with illness or water quality problems) have no issues at all with noise or traffic in a busy house. They are always looking for someone to give them food, and I think they enjoy 'interacting' with their external environment (smart little fish are Discus).

Keep us posted and good luck.

Regards,

Greggy

[alan j t]

im doing a 50% w/c daily wich looks like it helps
then i dose with formalin3
next i add salt to replace what was taken out
the lights are off all day till about 7 o clock wich i notice they come more out if they are off
i took out the only catfish to the planted tank so i saved a fish

so ill stop dosing the tank now since it is suggested it is a bad idea
my fluval304 is running with no carbon since the meds have been put in+ plenty of air stones

the tank has been set up for a long time
i did have angels in there but found to be aggresive so they were removed they ate almost all my neons and striped danios they were really small i have one of each now

the only survivors are 6 pencil fish,killies fish, betta and 2rams

i always test the water before and after a w/c
ph6.8
ammo0
nitrite0
nitrate 10
the temp prior to the fish getting fish was 82-84
i got a bunch of plants then a week later and they got sick it came with snails so i dont know if the plants or snails carried anything
so im still going crazy